Never the Same
by piaffe417
Summary: It's just not the same without her and he wonders how long she'll be gone. SG set during the reunion movie.


**Author's note** – Okay, it's been bugging me since the Sydney-less reunion movie aired and I finally had to do something about it. I'm not saying this is necessarily an uplifting something but, in my humble opinion, it's better than nothing. So here you have it: my explanation for the missing Sydney (set mid-movie). Apologies to Nia Peeples, Judson Mills, the Norris brothers, and anyone else who owns the characters herein portrayed. Apologies also to Rob Thomas for borrowing the lyrics to his song "Ever the Same." They're most certainly not mine. (And a note to my L&O:CI readers – the muse is not cooperating right now. Stay tuned.)

It's not the same. It's never the same anymore and some days Texas Ranger Francis Gage wants nothing more than a return to the past, to the sameness that made up his days for four years – the days when she was with him, when he could pick up the phone to hear her voice and take her to dinner and a movie after a particularly long week.

But it's not the same and it never will be again. He's resigned himself to that fact, not because he wants to, but because he has to. And in the meantime, if he is ever given the opportunity to edit the Ranger handbook, he's putting one very important rule in first and making sure that it's written in bold font, possibly even underlined: Don't sleep with your partner the night before she leaves for an indefinite period of time on a deep cover mission in Mexico. It may not seem that important, but maybe its addition would help him to save some other poor schmuck from putting himself in the same position that he's in now; maybe then he could save someone else from a broken heart with no impending promise of repair. (There are, of course, existing rules about fraternization, but since they obviously don't spell out how not to fall in love with your partner when she's petite, attractive, and manages to complete the other half of you that you didn't know was missing in the first place, Gage fully believes that one more rule can't possibly hurt.)

Of course, even without any specific written guidelines, Gage knew full well what he was setting himself up for when it happened. Sydney knew too and that singular knowledge made the act that much more desperate and the moment of parting that much more wrenching. And yet if knowledge is supposed to be power, in this case the reverse proved true, for as prepared as he thought he was for the emptiness that now plagues him, he had no idea how deep and all-encompassing it actually would be when it hit. It was like testing the depth of water with a toe and then diving in headfirst, only to discover (one broken neck later) that the initial impression was wrong and that it's too late to go back and make a different decision. And that's what hurts the most: the fact that he thought he was prepared - he thought he could handle it - and he's discovered in the two years that she's been gone that he is by no means able to cope. Even worse, Sydney is the one person he most wants to commiserate with and yet it's her being gone that is the source of his pain.

Irony has turned out to be Gage's biggest enemy, it seems.

Thankfully, irony doesn't seem to frequent his favorite after-work watering hole, so he sits on a barstool beside one of Company B's junior Rangers, Rhett Harper, and nurses the contents of a long neck bottle in an effort to squelch the somber mood that sometimes overcomes him in quiet moments. Working usually keeps his mind off things – car chases and criminals who fail to understand the meaning of the word "Freeze!" tend to require one's total concentration – but whenever he reaches the end of another day and faces the prospect of going home to an empty apartment, an empty bed, and no messages on his machine, he usually feels the bottom drop out of his day. A workout at the Ranger gym and then a beer with his coworkers is enough to occupy his evening hours but it doesn't change what happens after he tells his friends (usually Rangers Kay Austin, Harper, and – on nights when their wives permit – Captain Cordell Walker and James Trivette) "good night."

Harper is everything that Gage was when he first joined Company B – brash, charming, and (if the water cooler gossip is reliable) extremely eligible as far as bachelors go. It seems that the act of pinning a star to his chest only enhances the good old Southern boy aura that surrounds him and Gage has noticed that women never failed to flock to Harper, guaranteeing that the younger Ranger is very seldom dateless. And yet Gage is willing to bet his own star that it's only a matter of time before someone comes along and puts an end to Rhett Harper's "eligible" status, for amongst the other similarities that he sees in this dark-haired version of his younger self is that one trait in particular that is his own Achilles heel: the ability to love one woman so deeply and with such loyalty that no one else ever measures up. (For Harper's own sake, Gage hopes that maybe he'll have better luck when he chooses "the one." Otherwise the two of them may become permanent fixtures on the very barstools that they now occupy.)

Gage tries not to be bitter about Sydney's being gone – after all it's hardly her fault that the mission has lasted as long as it has (and he did encourage her to go in the first place). So if he wants to blame anyone, he has to blame himself for letting his guard down far enough for this situation to blindside him. The first rule he learned when he began training in the martial arts was to never let his guard down and he should have remembered from his childhood experiences in the group home that the same rule also applies to relationships with other people. This philosophy worked well in the past with his previous girlfriends and, even though his sister Julie continually told him to stop pushing people away, he hadn't learned how to do that until he met Sydney.

Sydney changed everything.

From the moment he met her, Gage had somehow always known that their partnership would be different from anything he'd ever known before. There was a synchronicity the way that they related to one another, an easiness and a lightness between them that he'd never experienced with anyone else (save Julie, and she'd known him his whole life). He trusted Sydney from the very beginning – trusted her to back his play when they were working, to cover his back when he needed it, and even trusted her enough to relate the story of his broken childhood without flinching away from the gritty parts. Sydney never let him down; she teased him, reprimanded him when she thought he had stepped out of line, and could stop him dead in his tracks with just a look from her dark eyes, but she never once let anything or anyone put him in harm's way. More than that, she was always there to support him and to listen when he needed to talk. _Always_ – until the spring day two years previous when he woke up in the morning and she wasn't.

Even Walker – their captain in Company B – had seemed to know the sacrifice he was asking them to make on the day that he called the pair into his office and made his request. His usual dealings with the younger Rangers were usually straightforward and conducted brusquely and efficiently, so Gage instantly knew that something was amiss the moment he asked them to sit down. They never sat down in his presence – merely got their orders, nodded their assent, and left – and Gage felt his stomach hit the floor at precisely the same moment that his rear end found the chair beneath him.

"We have a request from the ATF to partner with them on a new task force," Walker began, his tone already grim enough to impart the gravity of what he was about to ask of them. Even his eyes, which normally shone with humor, were veiled. "They're going after the Garcia-Muniz family and are hoping to get someone on the inside."

"The Garcia-Munizes smuggle the most illegal arms between here and the Mexican border," Sydney said then, her tone dubious as though she doubted the validity of the idea. "They have countless branches that help them – everyone from farmers to truck drivers to accountants, both here and in Mexico."

"It's a pretty tall order, Captain," Gage agreed.

Walker nodded in agreement. "They know that – and that's why they're asking for help. They're putting together a long-term operation with the hope that, if they can get someone in deep enough undercover, they can topple the whole thing from the top down."

"Some_one_?" Gage put emphasis on the singular part of his boss's statement.

Walker nodded, his grim expression deepening. "It's a deep cover operation – no contact with the outside world until the whole thing comes off. I spoke with the task force commander and recommended that the two of you go, based on your track record and history of successful undercover busts, but he thinks it will be very hard to get one person in and two is out of the question."

"So who are you thinking of sending?" Sydney asked, and Gage heard her voice tremble slightly. Side by side in their chairs facing Walker, their arms were touching and he felt goose pimples rise on her skin as his own muscles tensed for the response.

Walker didn't hesitate or drag out his reply: "They want Sydney."

Neither Gage nor Sydney could draw breath after Walker told them. Nor did they speak for the full minute of silence that ensued. Instead, they sat and stared at him in surprise, each lost in their own thoughts and too stunned to do more. And it was only after Gage felt himself blink that he became aware of how much time had passed, just as Sydney gathered herself and spoke:

"When do they need an answer?" she wanted to know.

"Tomorrow," Walker replied apologetically. His face was still dark with the gravity of what he was asking her to do – what he was asking _them_ to do.

"And when do they want me to go in?"

Gage could have sworn he heard her voice quaver slightly and he turned his head to look at her for the first time since hearing the news. Her lips were pursed tightly together and her face was a façade of calm that he knew was for the benefit of their boss and hid any true emotion that she felt.

"There's a party at one of Diego Muniz's clubs on Saturday night – they'd like to make that your insertion point," Walker told her. "They've set up a phony background, a rap sheet, social security information – the works."

"Sounds like they assume she's just going to do this," Gage's voice sounded unfamiliar to his own ears – it was more hollow than he remembered it being five minutes previous.

Sydney glanced sideways at him and from the way that her eyes traced his face, he could tell that his expression mirrored her own: shocked and afraid.

She turned back to their captain. "That doesn't give me a lot of prep time either."

Walker nodded in agreement. "I know. They were hoping to give you a month or so, but this opportunity just cropped up and they think it's the best chance they're going to get to put someone inside the operation."

"So in the next three days, I'm supposed to just wrap up my entire life here, sever all ties with friends and family, and leave for God knows how long to join an arms smuggling ring?" Sydney asked, a bit of ire in her tone.

"I'm sorry, Syd," Walker shook his head, his eyes sincere and concerned. "I really am. And please know that if you decide that you can't or don't want to do this, I won't force you to go. This is your choice."

"I'll tell you first thing in the morning," Sydney rose as she spoke, dark eyes troubled.

"Fair enough," Walker nodded in acceptance. He slid a manila folder across the desk to her. "All of the information the ATF has on the operation is in here. Take it with you."

Gage stood beside his partner, who scooped up the file and clasped it to her like a life preserver and, for the first time ever, fought the urge to gather her into his arms and carry her away to safety. It was an unfamiliar feeling – Sydney was entirely capable of taking care of herself in the most dangerous situations – and yet she now faced one that she couldn't fight her way out. She'd never looked small and helpless and the fact that Gage had never seen her look that way before scared him.

As the pair moved towards the door, Walker added, "Take the rest of the afternoon off. Austin and Harper can cover for you."

In the hallway outside the captain's office, Gage attempted to speak to his partner, opening with, "Hey, Shorty, I…" before she cut him off.

"I can't talk now, Gage," she shook her head and continued to hug the folder Walker had given her. "I'm sorry. I just… It's too much right now. I'll see you in the morning, okay?"

She'd turned away from him then and left him standing bewildered in her wake, so many thoughts running through his head at such speed that to pluck a stray one would have been a nearly impossible task.

Ranger James Trivette had approached as Sydney departed, stopping beside Gage to say, "So I guess Walker told you guys about the ATF operation, huh?"

"You _knew_?" Gage felt his jaw drop as he faced his fellow Ranger. As the shock surrounding Walker's request had begun to dissipate, emotions were becoming clearer to the burly Ranger and the one that manifested itself first was anger – anger which he was in danger of unloading on his friend.

Trivette very quickly sensed Gage's emotional state and put his hands up defensively. "He only told me this morning, man. He knew he was asking a lot of both of you."

"You think?" was all Gage could manage before he stalked away, fuming.

In the Ranger gym, he then proceeded to pummel his frustrations into the heavy bag, working for long enough to lose track of time and not stopping until his muscles ultimately protested the repeated strain. On his way home, showered and sore, he tried to call Sydney but only reached her machine and didn't bother to leave a message. He didn't know what to say anyway.

Even now, when he thinks back on those days that made up the last times that he spent with Sydney, he sees them as a blur even though he is able to pick out the singular thought that kept cycling through his mind: _he didn't think she'd really go_. Even after she came in with a stony face and told Walker that she'd do it, even after she'd asked Gage, Trivette, Walker, and Harper to help her pack away the contents of her apartment into a storage unit on the outskirts of Dallas, and even after she justified her reasons for going and showed him pictures of the Garcia-Muniz family handiwork – families killed, children used for collateral, and gang members equipped with the latest and greatest in automatic weaponry – he somehow couldn't wrap his mind around the fact that she'd be gone. Even after he'd agreed with her decision and supported it, the truth of it didn't hit him: They wouldn't sit down for coffee together in the mornings. They wouldn't watch old Bruce Lee movies together on Saturday afternoons. They wouldn't spar together in the Ranger gym after work. He wouldn't pick up the phone and find her there when he needed to talk.

They wouldn't be together at all.

It was no surprise, then, when she showed up on his doorstep just after eleven on Friday night, the Friday before she was to begin the operation and sever all contacts with her life as Sydney Cooke, Texas Ranger in order to become Estella Torres, cocktail waitress. They'd just seen each other hours before when he and Walker had dropped her off at her hotel, having just completed the last run to her storage locker. Harper and Trivette had hugged her good-bye after they closed and locked the door on the items that had made up her home and her life, warning her to be careful and looking at her in such a way that it was clear they were trying to memorize her face. And at the entrance to the Dallas Hampton Inn and Suites, Walker and Gage had done the same.

But it wasn't a final good-bye and Gage knew it. Two people who had been through as much together as they had – who felt as much for each other as they did – couldn't wrap up their entire four year partnership with a quick hug and a "Good luck." To do so would be the equivalent of beginning a marriage with a handshake.

Her knock on the door was soft – almost tentative – but he'd been waiting for it and opened the door promptly, trying not to seem as disheveled as he knew he looked in the sweat pants and t-shirt he'd snatched from the floor when he arrived home. She stood before him, wearing the same jeans and sweater he'd last seen her in, her hair loose and her face free of makeup. Yet when she looked up at him (she always had to look up – her diminutive stature wouldn't let her do otherwise), her eyes were both frightened and earnest.

"Gage, I…" she managed to say before he cut her off with a shake of his head.

"I know," he nodded and tried to swallow before discovering that the lump in his throat was too big.

She stepped forward then and he stepped to meet her. Somewhere in the middle, they met – lips, hands, bodies - and his thoughts blurred.

_We were drawn from the weeds  
We were brave like soldiers  
Falling down under the pale moonlight  
You were holding to me  
Like a someone broken  
And I couldn't tell you but I'm telling you now _

Just let me hold you while you're falling apart  
Just let me hold you so we both fall down

Fall on me  
Tell me everything you want me to be  
Forever with you forever in me  
Ever the same

In the night, they shared their tears, not only for the loss of their present, but of a future that they'd been afraid to move towards – a future that was no longer in the cards. They'd hesitated to take the step and they'd lost and disappointment tasted of salt and guilt was bitter tonic.

"I do love you," she'd confessed. "I always have."

"I know," he'd said. "I love you too."

And because they were saying good-bye, both knew it was the truth.

We would stand in the wind  
We were free like water  
Flowing down  
Under the warmth of the sun  
Now it's cold and we're scared  
And we've both been shaken

_Look at us  
Man, this doesn't need to be the end  
_

"Why did we wait?" she asked when the sky had turned a smoky gray and the pink edge of the sun threatened to reveal itself on the horizon. The question didn't seem pointed at him, but rather was almost rhetorical in tone, as though she was merely wondering aloud and didn't expect an answer.

He gave her one anyway, pressing a kiss into her dark hair and admitting, "We didn't think it'd ever change. Took things for granted, I guess."

"I don't want to go," she said softly.

"Yes you do," he disagreed, partly from habit and partly because it was the truth. "You've wanted to take the Diego-Munizes down ever since you saw the pictures of those kids. It's your job, Syd. And you'd hate yourself if you stayed and didn't try to help."

"I don't want to leave you," she told him and he let that go without comment, just pulled her closer and closed his eyes in an effort to pretend that the room wasn't getting lighter.

Just let me hold you while you're falling apart  
Just let me hold you so we both fall down

Fall on me

_Tell me everything you want me to be  
Forever with you  
Forever in me  
Ever the same  
_

When he woke up, she was gone and sunlight was flooding his bedroom. At first groggy, it took a few extra seconds for him to recall the events that had occurred the night before – and nearly a minute for the silence to register soundly in his ears. Reflexively, he closed his eyes, rolled onto his stomach, and reached an arm across to the other side of the bed, half-heartedly hoping that the warm body of his partner would be there and not expecting to feel anything but what he did: a cool expanse of vacant sheet.

A note on his bedside table shared Sydney's parting thoughts:

"_Gage – I couldn't stay. I'm sorry. I couldn't face the thought of saying good-bye to you, not now anyway. And if I'm any good at my job, it shouldn't be a permanent good-bye anyway. I don't know how long this operation will last and I don't know what will happen, but I am sure of one thing this morning and that is this: I love you and I'm going to do everything in my power to come back to you soon. It's not a great promise, but it's all I have right now._

_I'm not asking you to wait for me – it isn't fair for me to do that. I want you to find love and to be loved because you deserve it. Julie always tells you not to push people away and she's right. But if you go through whatever the next months and years bring and you don't find anyone who fits the bill of Ms. Right (or anyone who has my roundhouse kick!), please know that I'm yours. I always have been – even when I couldn't admit it to you or myself._

_I love you, Francis Gage, and I wish I'd told you earlier. Things haven't been the same since I met you and they won't be right while we're apart. Shorty_."

He still has the note in the top drawer of his nightstand. In a frame on top is a picture of the two of them taken at Walker's ranch during a barbecue – they'd played Frisbee and when Trivette had thrown a particularly long pass, Gage had managed to catch Sydney and the disc, while Walker's wife Alex had captured the entire moment on film. He looks at it each night before he goes to sleep and wonders where she is, if she's safe, and if she's thinking of him.

It's been two years and he still wonders so he knows it's love. No other emotion carries that power.

_Call on me  
I'll be there for you and you'll be there for me  
Forever it's you  
Forever in me  
Ever the same  
_

"Can I get a beer?" a leggy blonde steps up to the bar and interrupts Gage's thoughts, leaning into his space to pass some bills to the bartender.

"How about you let me buy you that beer?" Gage asks her, turning on the charm. She's cute enough and she's close enough that he can smell her perfume.

One look at him and she can obviously sense that his heart isn't in it, though, because she turns him down – then adds insult to injury by allowing Harper to step in and pick up her tab. The younger Ranger then follows her back to her table, joining two other girls and proceeding to relate his stories from the job.

"Looks like you've lost your touch," Ranger Kay Austin observes dryly from Gage's other side.

He gives her a wry grin. "I don't know how he does it."

"Of course you do," Kay chides him lightly. "Aren't you the same Ranger Francis Gage who was taken hostage by three escaped female convicts and managed to charm your way out of it without a single weapon being fired? And the same Ranger Francis Gage who got fan mail for months after working undercover at Medieval Times as a knight in shining armor?"

He grins at the memories. "Yeah, so they tell me."

"Then don't tell me that you don't know how Rhett does it," Kay shakes her head and takes another sip of her beer. After a moment's pause, her tone grows serious and she asks him, "How long are you going to wait for her?"

He glances sideways and sees that her eyes are patient and her expression empathetic. She's concerned.

He shrugs. "As long as I still love her."

"That's not an easy proposition," she muses.

"Nope," he agrees and drains the last of his beer. There's nothing else to say. It isn't easy and maybe he's an idiot for waiting in the first place, but until the chapter in his life entitled "Sydney and Me" is officially closed, he can't start a new one. He doesn't know how and right now he doesn't want to know.  
_  
You may need me there  
To carry all your weight  
But you're no burden I assure  
You tide me over  
With a warmth I'll not forget  
But I can only give you love_

He steps into the cool Dallas night and heads for his motorcycle (as Walker and a recent high-speed chase have recently seen to it that he is car-less), taking a brief moment to glance up at the stars and wonder for the millionth time where she is and what she's thinking of. It's not the same without herbut Gage doesn't want things to be the same – he just wants her back.

Different is just fine, but if Sydney were there it would be better.

FIN


End file.
